


Shades of Three

by PSIDontKnow



Series: Wicker Wrapped Brimstone [1]
Category: Kingdom Hearts
Genre: Alternate Universe, Beginning of a huge AU thing, Gen, Rewrite
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-01-22
Updated: 2014-01-22
Packaged: 2018-01-09 15:14:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,121
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1147500
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PSIDontKnow/pseuds/PSIDontKnow
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They find them, bloody and scared, and decide to keep them.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Where a Story Begins

  _Every story has a beginning, and not just one, but many, and where do you begin from there? It can be said this story begins at the beginning of time, when humans were created along with those called the Faekin, and their many decendants. It could start when a boy looses his mentor, or when a girl decides to give herself to save her friends. It could start when an 'angel' falls and vows revenge or when a part of a Faekin longs with all his non-existant heart to be whole again. It could start when two teenagers find a third and become a family._  
 _It can and does start at all those places, for a story is naught but many stories interwoven, but for you dear reader, it begins with a wish. It's a small thing, but it brings together a creature that was half of two species that hated each other and could not survive for much longer and a little boy. It's been so long that no one remembers what such an insignificant wish was, few barely remember that the boy had blue eyes and the creature looked like a latern personified, all yellow glow chasing and calling the shadows._  
 _They do know that two became one, and they lived in harmony for a long time, until they were split. By what it is unknown, but it caused a split so violent that both the creature and boy were split into two after being split from each other._  
 _That is where your story begins, reader mine._  



	2. Gifts Left at Witching Hour

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sooooo, huge rewrite going on in honour of getting my RP blog for this AU up. It's just for Namine and Xion, but I have another for Sora and Roxas. Sadly, none of them will be appearing soon, as I'm setting up the story's beginning currently.  
> How you like them babus?

     It's a scream that wakes them up. They jolt up out of the bed at the noise, gangly limbs that suit their 14 year old selves flailing in surprise before they drop to the floor, mirroring the other even though they are in two separate rooms. She grabs the knife under her pillow as she  leaves the room, meeting him and giving a smirk at the fact he had grabbed his wooden training sword. They've lived with a hunter since they were small, they know that something screaming in the night is rarely human and to be sparingly trusted.

"Terra, what time is it anyway?" Aqua asks, running a hand through blue dyed hair that is beginning to show blond at the roots, a yawn slurring her words together.

"I 'unno, like three AM?"

"Isn't that witching hour?"

"Depends on who you ask." They stand in the hallway awkwardly, weapons ready to attack should anything come into their home, ready to defend it in their master's absence, but nothing does, there's not even another scream and they creep cautiously towards the front door. The girl cautiously peaks through the blinds, trying to see what could have made such a horrid shriek and can see a dark shape outside, not close enough to the house to trigger the movement lights, but the moon outside lets her make out some features.

"Terra, it's a boy."

"What? There is no freakin' way."

"Yeah, it looks like he's holding onto another kid." She squints, trying to get a better look. "I'm going to go outside and get a closer look." She's already edging towards the door, letting the blind snap back to place as she folds the knife back shut and tucks it inside her bra. Just because they look like normal children doesn't mean they are. As soon as she steps outside, the lights flip on, flooding the yard and surrounding area. Their house sat in the middle of about ten acres of land, the only path up to the house a gravel path that their master's SUV normally sat at the front of.

The figure was in the grass, shivering in the fall chill and likely soaked from the dew on the ground and he jumped back from the light when it turned on, arms moving around the other child in his arms and pulling them close like a large teddy bear, paying no mind when the other's head lolled to the side limply. Aqua moved carefully and tried to push down the immature part of her that wanted to go get Terra to deal with them, as they had not a shred of clothing on them.

She can't though, because she can see the bruises and cuts on their bodies, the blood staining bodies that seem too fragile. The one that is alert is watching her, squeezing tightly to the one in his arms, shivering and glaring, eyes that are too bright a gold to be human narrowed in distrust. A pale hand reaches out to them and is met with a hiss.

"I'm not going to hurt you."Aqua says softly, but she can see his chest moving as he takes rapid breaths and is reminded of a rabbit she once had and vague words from the TV playing in the background while she made necklaces in her free time, words like 'hyperventilation' and 'shock.' She backs away, blue eyes watching gold before she turns and runs back to the house, opening the door and narrowly avoiding slamming into Terra.

"I'm not sure if they're human, but one's out cold and the other is freaked out." She speaks as fast as she walks, heading for the cupboard where they keep the spare blankets for cold nights and grabs out her favorite, a soft, blue thing covered in snowflakes. "You should probably come with me too, in case they need help inside."

"Weapons?" Terra asked softly, following her with concern in his dark eyes.

"No, they're too worn to do much harm, and even then," She paused with her hand on the door knob, looking at him over her shoulder with a fond smile. "I'll have a huge meat head to protect lil' ol' me." The brunette smiles, a small, wry thing that says the insult is affectionate before they both head outside. The gold eyed child growls low in his throat, or at least tries to before it turns into a squeak then a cough. Aqua unfolds the blanket, reaching to wrap it around his shoulders, jolting her arm away when he snaps at it like a scared dog. She knows that Terra is standing behind her, looking as intimidating as his awkward form can, muscles beginning to fill out what had been limber height their entire childhood.

"My name's Aqua, this is Terra. Do you need help?" Her voice was soft like she was dealing with a wounded animal. The boy stared at them, eyes flicking back and forth between the two people in front of him, pulling the blanket closer to him and the limp blond in his arms. He didn't respond though, just watched from under black bangs. He did react when Terra crouched down and reached for the boy he held. He hissed and pulled the other closer, a limp hand falling away and trailing the ground, going blue and purple under the nails.

"Easy, easy, we need to get you two inside though, look at your nails, your fingers are going purple. We won't hurt you, we can't, we're just two kids who will be alone for at least another week." Terra smiled softly as he said this, hands held up in the universal sign for no harm. "Just let us take you inside, okay? Some clothes and a meal, we won't hurt you." The boy still looked distrustful, but didn't jerk away when Terra took the burden from his arms, just stood shakily and wrapped the blanket closer to his form. He jumped when Aqua hesitantly wrapped an arm around his waist, helping him limp to the house as Terra walked like holding the boy princess style was as easy as lifting a basket of flowers.

They ended up getting the boys inside and leaving the unconscious blond on the master's bed and washing up the black haired one in the adjoining bathroom, Aqua rubbing at his cuts with a rag doused in antiseptic while he hisses and slaps at her hands, Terra wrapping the wounds as soon as she moves on to the next. The first aid kit was almost out of butterfly sutures once they were done with him.

"I'm going to start on the other one."

"Okay, you can come out there too, or sit in here and warm up." Terra said the last part while handing the boy a robe from the cabinet, watching as he wrapped himself in the terrycloth before following Aqua with his arms full of the first aid kit and more rags. The boy stood there, the shivering from before almost gone before following, watching as they repeated the process with the boy on the bed. He didn't say anything, just watched mutely, waiting for the boy to open his eyes and hiss at the alcohol sting, but he didn't.

He wouldn't like this.

The brunette shivered and wrapped the robe tighter around himself, blinking the sudden tears in his eyes away and wished that the feeling of emptiness would leave as easily. The one with dyed blue hair - Aqua (and what an ironic name that is) - straightens up, and looks at him, eyes an electric blue that matches her hair.

"Could you tell us your names? We're okay with only nicknames if you can't give us your true names." The boy wants to laugh in her face, snap at her that their true name was lost when they splintered and it was hell trying to do anything without being whole. He didn't though, because along with being separated, he was no longer just an idea that was an amalgamation of bitter feelings, but he had the full spectrum now, fear and apprehension thick on his tongue.

"Vanitas." He muttered, ducking his head meekly. A part of him that still remembered being whole screamed and cursed at him, but it was being drowned out by the new part of him that was raw emotions and a child's mind.

"Okay, Vanitas, that's good." Terra says softly, coming to stand next to the boy, dropping a hand tiredly on his shoulder. Aqua on the other hand frowns, turning to busy herself with covering the unconscious boy on the bed. She's had Latin lessons, she speaks it almost fluently at this point and knows the boy's name is Vanity.

"Ventus, is he okay?" The boy's voice croaks when he speaks and she chalks it up to the loud scream he'd woken them with.

     "He'll be fine once he wakes up, nothing worse than you. I actually think he fared better, other than that nasty cut to his head." She straightens and turns with all the neatness of a soldier, heels smacking together as she places hands on thin hips and speaks with a broad smile. "How about some food?"

 

 

 


	3. Pizza and Pronunciation

     They sit piled around the kitchen table, Vanitas swinging his legs and practically swimming in one of Aqua's shirts and Terra's shorts, watching as the girl hastily makes food. With every moment he spends not focused on remembering, he's beginning to forget. Who he was, why he was that way, why Ventus is important. His hands shake still, so he keeps them in his lap and watches with a sour face. The brunette next to him, a large teen named Terra, was falling asleep, dark blue eyes drifting shut slowly before his head would snap back up.

     "Food's up." Aqua said cheerfully, setting down three bowls of eggs, bread sitting on top to make sandwiches with. A fourth bowl sat on the counter, in case the last person woke, but he didn't. They ate quickly, Terra almost choking on his food as he tried not to laugh at the fact the child had fallen asleep with his head in his hand, fork grasped limply in his hand.

     "Terra, carry him to bed or something." Aqua snorted as she pounded on his back.

     "Which bed?" He chokes out, clearing his throat.

     "I guess with the other boy, did you see how protective he had been? Something bad must have happened to them." Her voice tapered off and Terra stood abruptly, jarring her from that line of thought. He bent over, carefully picking the boy up, adjusting when he murmured tiredly and clung to the elder's neck. Aqua remembers with a pang of guilt that Terra had said he'd had a little brother before the master had taken him in. The other apprentice doesn't seemed bothered though as he takes the boy, coming back a few minutes later, rubbing at his neck.

     "The kid is a koala." He says with a grimace and Aqua quickly hides her laughter behind her hand.

 

     They wake in the morning to the sound of someone yelling.

     It's a terrible repeat of the night before, the knife still pressed close to Aqua's heart and the practice sword waiting in the corner of the hall as the two of them as they race to their master's room, watching with wide eyes and stunned expressions.

     "WHY WON'T YOU TALK?" Vanitas screams into Ventus's face, sitting on the blond's chest and holding him up by his face. His eyes are open, but that's that only sign he's awake. Terra's the first one to snap out of it, moving into the room, Aqua following.

     "Vanitas, stop." He growls, putting his arms under the boy's and pulling him away once Aqua's pried his fingers off the other's face. The raven haired child just screams, a noise that bores into their heads before he goes limp, breathing heavily, tears running down his face. Aqua looks at him, concern in her eyes before she checks the boy on the bed. His cheeks are red, but that seems to be the only damage Vanitas had inflicted. The cut on his forehead was ugly and bruised, but he was awake, blue eyes blinking slowly.

     Terra slowly released his grip on the boy in his arms, easily blocking when he turned around and started punching him weakly. He looked confused as to whether he should be angry or sad, his face flickering between the two as tears flowed and he punched Terra's arm over and over.

     "They broke us." He chokes out between hits before sobbing into Terra, the confused teen lightly patting his back, sending a pleading look to Aqua over the boy's head. She's just as confused as him, brow creased in sadness for them.

     "V-Van..." The voice isn't any higher than a whisper, but the boy still stiffens at the voice before darting over, almost knocking Aqua over. He says something in a long drawn out string of gibberish, the only thing the teens are able to recognize is the boy's names and his pleading tone. The blond doesn't say anything, just stares blankly at him and Vanitas's face contorts into rage before he digs his nails into his palms and stops talking, just stares back.

     "Let's see if we can get him sat up, yeah?" Aqua tittered, moving to pull the boy up. Surprisingly, he goes along with it, moving the rest of the way on his own once he figures out what's going on, though his blue eyes are still blank.

     "I'm, uh, going to leave you boys alone for a moment and go see if I can go find you guys clothes that'll fit." She leaves quickly, a blush rising to her cheeks as she realizes that they had never found clothes for the unconscious boy the night before. Terra leans against the wall, watching the boys, Ventus with his tilted down like it was too much of a chore to hold it up and Vanitas watching the other with cold eyes.

     "Vanitas." He doesn't snap to attention, just rolls his head lazily to look at Terra, eyes showing anger and pain covered in a layer of hoarfrost. "Why did you attack Ventus?"

     "I didn't attack him, I just - the idiot needs to talk to me." His tone switches from being that of a child alone in the world to spiteful quickly, like he feels the need to hide his emotions.

     "But why?"

     "Because he's mine!" He snaps, on the edge of a sob with his teeth bared in a sad mockery of a feral animal and Terra tenses, because his eyes aren't bright gold now, they're an acidic yellow, glowing in the sunlight filtering into the room. They stay that way until they notice Ventus creeping his hand across the bed and while Vanitas doesn't take it, he places his own next to it, skin touching skin and calms, eyes returning to bright gold. The room is quiet until Aqua comes back with an armful of clothes and her wallet hanging by it's chain off her wrist.

     "Brought you boys some of my clothes, the shirts are a bit small on me, so they should fit you fine and you may have to roll up the pants legs. I'm going to order some pizza."

     "I'll come with you." Terra spoke softly as he pushes off of the wall and follows his friend out of the room with a soft click of the door shutting. Vanitas watches the door for a moment before poking at the clothes Aqua left, deciding to take the black shirt and  grey sweatpants, handing the black shorts and Mickey Mouse emblazoned t-shirt. He trades the clothes he'd borrowed last night for the clean clothing, frowning when he noticed Ventus hadn't moved at all.

     "You stupid broken thing." He sighed, taking the clothes from him and helping the other into them, instructing him what to do. When they were both dressed, shorts hanging down past Ventus's knees and pants rolled up above Vanitas's ankles, they walked out into the living room, the raven headed boy holding onto the blond's hand, leading him a bit roughly. The boy only stumbled a bit surprisingly, and held on to Vanitas's hand.

     "We ordered pepperoni and cheese pizza, as well as a veggie pizza, is that okay with you two?" Aqua asked, smiling at the sight of them.

     "Don't touch the veggie pizza, that's for high queen rabbit food over here. " Terra whispered loudly, grinning when Aqua half heartedly smacked his arm.

     "Vegetables are good for you Terra, if you ate some, maybe your muscles would grow faster."

     "You just eat them in hopes that your boobs will grow."

     "You shut up you overgrown amoeba!" She growled, leaning up into Terra's grinning face. Their two guests were forgotten as they snipped at each other. The boys were confused, it plainly showing on Vanitas's face, Ventus's emotions amplifying through him. It was comforting to know that even without much response, Ventus was still in there, the other part of him was still in there. The other two eventually stop squabbling, mostly because Vanitas's stomach rumbled loudly and so they set the two of them up with some cookies that Aqua had to climb on a chair and then reach into the very back of the top of a cabinet for.

     Vanitas, nibbled at them,  watching Ventus before hissing something in that gibberish language again and shoving a cookie into the other's hand, waving it in front of his face before purposefully taking a large bite out of his own cookie. It took a moment before he followed suit, the teens watching with worried faces. The boy didn't care though, just rooted for his mind for a connection that felt sore to the touch and sent something like a pat on the back along with an insult along to connection. He smiled to himself when it was returned with a feeling of confusion and familiarity from the other side, hiding the look by shoving the rest of his cookie in his mouth.

 

     "They sure do sleep a lot." Terra remarked, watching the boys who had fallen asleep on the living room floor, credits rolling in front of them and a half finished slice of pizza on a plate by Vanitas's elbow. It was heartwarming though, to see them side by side, one's left foot crossed with the other's right.

     "They're tired and healing Terra, those cuts we're going to have to watch for infection." Aqua said with a sigh as she collected everyone's plates, tip toeing to grab Vanitas's discarded plate.

     "I meant to tell you something, earlier, I asked Vanitas why he had attacked Ventus, because it's such a major change from how he's acted the rest of the time." Terra continued, following her into the kitchen as she put the plates in the sink, placing the leftover slice back in the two boxes that contained the remainders of three pizzas.

     "And his answer was?" She pondered, putting the boxes into the refrigerator.

     "That's the strange part, he said that Ventus was his and his eyes glowed until Ventus started reaching for him." She paused before looking at him, blond eyebrows drawn together.

     "That's strange."

     "I think they're not human. When he was hitting me this morning he kept saying that someone had broken them." Terra came closer to Aqua, speaking in hushed tones like they were children hiding under the other's blankets past bed time again.

     "Terra..." Aqua's voice was just as soft, electric blue eyes flickering to the living room where the boys in question slept. "We're going to help them?" It was supposed to be a statement, but her voice hitched on the end, turning it into a question the brunette mutely nodded to.

     "Yeah, we're going to keep them safe until the master comes back, then he'll know what to do."

 

     The two boys slept a lot, and stayed close to each other. Vanitas sometimes spoke to Ventus in that gibberish language, to which the other would look at him blankly and sometimes cock his head to the side before Vanitas would reply. Terra and Aqua watched them closely, but the most non human thing is that if they snuck up on them, their eyes would glow, Vanitas's like acid light lanterns and Ven's sparkling like a back lit night sky.

     They hear Ventus's voice the last night before their master is supposed to come home, speaking softly with Vanitas in the middle of the night.

     "Vah-nee-tahs." The name is said carefully, the voice croaking from not being used.

     "Okay, that's me, what about the lummox?"

     "Teh-rah?"

     "And the bleeding heart?"

     "Ah-ku-wa." The two of them stood together by the door to the guest room that the boys were using as their own, staring at each other.

     "Is he teaching Ventus how to speak?" Aqua asks, brow creased as she tries to decide whether or not to be offended to being referred to as a bleeding heart.

     "Sounds more like reminding to me." Terra shrugged, walking into the room without much ceremony, causing both of the boys to jump. Aqua followed him, looking at the boys. Vanitas was glaring at them, upset about having been interrupted, but Ventus still looked at them with tired, glassy eyes, though they looked a touch more awake than normal.

     "Hi." The blonde said sleepily, what might be a smile trying to curve his lips, and Aqua smiled at him while Terra reached for Vanitas, locking the other in a headlock before he could try to run.

     "So I'm a lummox, hunh?" He huffed playfully, rubbing his knuckles viciously against the other's head.

     "Stop it you muscle brained jerk! Meany! Idiot!" The insults got more childish as he shrieked, flailing to get out of Terra's grip. Once he was finally free he sticks his tongue out at the laughing brunette before poking Ventus in the stomach with his bare toes.

     "You're supposed to help me you broken thing." He hisses, and Ventus doesn't much respond, but Aqua frowns opening her mouth to speak before Vanitas cocks his head like a bird, listening to something  before he promptly plops on the floor, glaring at the other.

     "At least I can still hold my thoughts together for more than five seconds!" Ventus stuck his tongue out, mimicking what the raven haired boy had done moments before. They begin their weird one sided conversations again, Vanitas speaking in another tongue while Ven doesn't make much noise, just a whine or a hiss here and there. The apprentices leave them to it, walking out of the room.

     "Vanitas is cruel to Ventus isn't he?"

     "It seems more like a brother who doesn't want to admit to caring about his sibling." True to Terra's words, when they check in on them later, they're piled into the guest bed, Ventus curled into himself but facing Vanitas who was sprawled with an arm thrown over him. They smiled and shut the door before heading to their own rooms with quiet bids goodnight.

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next chapter: Enter Eraqus!  
> Also, I'm so so so sorry that everyone is terribly OOC


End file.
